This is important:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/28/opinion/28krugman.html?_r=2
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Happily the beat goes on...
Nothing has been quite as rewarding as seeing some of the work that I started in Mauritania be carried on even though I left in the middle of it. When doing development work the ideal is always to have it be sustainable and in some of my early blogs I talked about how I wanted my presence in Mauritania to be a catalyst for development, a sort of Jujitsu development. Turns out I was able to do that, at least a little. Here are some of the ways:
- Woni, the amazing mother of my counterpart with whom I started a tree nursery, has planted another tree nursery of several hundred trees to sell. Given that you all know the saga of trying to get this project going, you can understand how happy it makes me.
- Samba, my tireless counterpart, is finishing the tree planting campaign that we talked about and that I dug forty holes for.
- Taban Lo, a random person who I met that has a rototiller, has followed my suggestion to rent out his machine to cooperatives and farmers and made half of the purchase cost of the rototiller back in the first week. Now another individual has bought a brand new rototiller just to be able to rent it out. This is a huge success.
- Last but most, I did not manage to send a Mauritanian Youth Delegation to the UN Climate Change Negotiations in Copenhagen, but I did get funding for one of them thanks to some volunteers and the Young Friends of the Earth in Germany. This is the success that really has me jumping out of my shorts. To this day, participating in the conference in 2007 was the most remarkable and life changing event I have experienced and I can only imagine it will be the same for a young Mauritanian. This is not a guaranteed deal yet, visas and other issues still need to be worked out, but the big problem, the money, is there. Still this is huge news and it is difficult for me to express the importance of this UN conference. It will be the most important event in the history of the fight against climate change as it will set the new international agreement until 2050, or not... It is imperative for the world that the negotiations go well. I encourage everyone to take a strong interest in following how the negotiations are going and supporting strong targets. A little sacrifice today is going to save the world a whole lot of trouble in the coming years.
- Woni, the amazing mother of my counterpart with whom I started a tree nursery, has planted another tree nursery of several hundred trees to sell. Given that you all know the saga of trying to get this project going, you can understand how happy it makes me.
- Samba, my tireless counterpart, is finishing the tree planting campaign that we talked about and that I dug forty holes for.
- Taban Lo, a random person who I met that has a rototiller, has followed my suggestion to rent out his machine to cooperatives and farmers and made half of the purchase cost of the rototiller back in the first week. Now another individual has bought a brand new rototiller just to be able to rent it out. This is a huge success.
- Last but most, I did not manage to send a Mauritanian Youth Delegation to the UN Climate Change Negotiations in Copenhagen, but I did get funding for one of them thanks to some volunteers and the Young Friends of the Earth in Germany. This is the success that really has me jumping out of my shorts. To this day, participating in the conference in 2007 was the most remarkable and life changing event I have experienced and I can only imagine it will be the same for a young Mauritanian. This is not a guaranteed deal yet, visas and other issues still need to be worked out, but the big problem, the money, is there. Still this is huge news and it is difficult for me to express the importance of this UN conference. It will be the most important event in the history of the fight against climate change as it will set the new international agreement until 2050, or not... It is imperative for the world that the negotiations go well. I encourage everyone to take a strong interest in following how the negotiations are going and supporting strong targets. A little sacrifice today is going to save the world a whole lot of trouble in the coming years.
New and improved village
A while ago I mentioned that if anyone was looking for a vacation, or just had no work, they should come and spend some time in Mauritania. I can't say that I am surprised that no one took me up on that. It was not exactly a tourist destination; the town where we had our training was described by Lonely Planet as "a sleazy border town with a sinister feel" and the book recommended generally avoiding the whole country. I don't agree with any of that but I do have to admit it wasn't the hottest tourist destination. Senegal, however, is. So you should all come to visit especially since my work is about bringing more tourists. When you think about it, you coming to vacation in Senegal is going to help me with my development work, so do a good deed and come bum around Senegal. Seriously.
For more information check out the tourism section on www.pcsenegal.org
and http://www.lonelyplanet.com/senegal
Additionally, I just got back from visiting my site. Someone asked me to describe what it was like in a word: Perfect. Somewhere in between swimming at the base of 400 foot waterfalls, walking around the small paths between the corn rows in my village, planning hiking trips around the mountains, seeing my new excessively large hut, talking with my work partners who have already starting doing the work I am going to help them with, chasing around my host mother's monkey, shooting the shit with the elders, strolling through the forest, and hearing chimpanzees I compared what my new site is like and what my site in Mauritania was like and I nearly cried. I cannot complain about anything as long as I am here. I don't have photos yet, but the photos section on the region's website: www.pckedougou.org
For more information check out the tourism section on www.pcsenegal.org
and http://www.lonelyplanet.com/senegal
Additionally, I just got back from visiting my site. Someone asked me to describe what it was like in a word: Perfect. Somewhere in between swimming at the base of 400 foot waterfalls, walking around the small paths between the corn rows in my village, planning hiking trips around the mountains, seeing my new excessively large hut, talking with my work partners who have already starting doing the work I am going to help them with, chasing around my host mother's monkey, shooting the shit with the elders, strolling through the forest, and hearing chimpanzees I compared what my new site is like and what my site in Mauritania was like and I nearly cried. I cannot complain about anything as long as I am here. I don't have photos yet, but the photos section on the region's website: www.pckedougou.org
Easier the second time around
Yep, life this past few weeks has been pretty easy and relaxed, but not boring. I have to say the second time around, everything seems to be a bit easier. Of course it helps that the physical environment of Senegal is better in every way. Also, learning a different dialect of a language you already know is cake by comparison to learning a totally new language. Still, I am finding it very interesting to relearn a different Pulaar. It is helping me learn and understand grammatical structures that I wasn’t able to pick up the first time around. Additionally having already been through and gotten over most of the cultural differences makes a huge difference. I just a few weeks I am at the level of integration and comfort with host family number three (Therno, Therno Hamidou, Kajatu, Kajatu, Hawa, Hawa, Bilow, Aliou, Neene, and many other of course) that it took me several months to reach with my host family at site and I never reached with my first training family. It also helps that I feel more at ease in the, by comparison to Mauritania, liberal Senegalese society. Its sort of weird to be able to have physical contact like shaking hands with women again. Sort of like I can finally relax after a year of being on edge and always having to remember that any public contact could be offensive depending on who was around.
At the same time, starting over for the second time with a year still to go feels about as long as starting for the first time with two years ahead of me. Although I know this will be a fleeting feeling based on how quickly the last year went by. Actually I expect this year to go by even faster largely due to the fact that structure, staff, and direction of PC Senegal seems to be more conducive to more work achievements. I hold the staff of PC RIM in high regard, especially Obie, the country director, and Aw and Kane, my bosses, what they were able to accomplish and maintain up until the end in Mauritania was nothing short of remarkable. Yet, for a variety of reasons, Senegal is easier to operate in and therefore more is possible.
As of yet I have not had much technical training on what I will be doing as an eco-tourism volunteer but I will be going out to my site in a few weeks and should have a better idea after that. Most likely I will be working on improving a tourist lodge in my village, working on trails to the waterfalls, and promoting my site as a tourist destination. I am more excited about the physical work and the purpose it is trying to achieve than I was with my old position. Apparently when I get posted to the site I will be living with the village chief, and will be changing my last name for the fourth time. (Sow to Sall to Ba to Diallo for those who are keeping track.) As always, I will be keeping my first name of Amadou just for simplicity’s sake. Its sort of funny, at my old site everyone was trying to get me to change my last name to Ba because the name of my town literally meant “the place of Ba.” Now that it is finally my name I will soon be changing it to Diallo, which is currently the last name I am supposed to want because “Diallo’s only eat beans, leaves, and dirt” I have to say. This brings up the joking relationships between families and friends that exists here. I believe I have mentioned this before but it is work ruminating on again.
They love to pick on each other. At first this seemed crass and socially “undeveloped” to me, but I have come to appreciate it in the wider context of how the culture operates. Can you imagine going up to a Smith in the states that you didn’t know and saying “your last name is no good, you’re whole family is dirty and eats trash” just because your last name is Thomas and expect the person to not think twice about it? One of the great advantages of a culture that places high value on community is that it takes a lot to disrupt the social equilibrium. My old landlord and I used to get into vicious verbal fights about the rent every month because, and the whole village agreed with this, he was crazy. Still no matter how upset we were with each other that day he never held a drudge into the morning. Personally I believe that part of that was because he had to recognize that my position was pretty reasonable and he was just trying to extort money from me, despite the fact that he always ended every argument about trying to get me to pay more that we had agreed to with “in the end money does matter it is only God who judges us.” Which I thought was pretty ironic. Whatever the reasons were, the fact that he never was angry the next day is very typical for West African culture and that I hope has positively rubbed off on me.
At the same time, starting over for the second time with a year still to go feels about as long as starting for the first time with two years ahead of me. Although I know this will be a fleeting feeling based on how quickly the last year went by. Actually I expect this year to go by even faster largely due to the fact that structure, staff, and direction of PC Senegal seems to be more conducive to more work achievements. I hold the staff of PC RIM in high regard, especially Obie, the country director, and Aw and Kane, my bosses, what they were able to accomplish and maintain up until the end in Mauritania was nothing short of remarkable. Yet, for a variety of reasons, Senegal is easier to operate in and therefore more is possible.
As of yet I have not had much technical training on what I will be doing as an eco-tourism volunteer but I will be going out to my site in a few weeks and should have a better idea after that. Most likely I will be working on improving a tourist lodge in my village, working on trails to the waterfalls, and promoting my site as a tourist destination. I am more excited about the physical work and the purpose it is trying to achieve than I was with my old position. Apparently when I get posted to the site I will be living with the village chief, and will be changing my last name for the fourth time. (Sow to Sall to Ba to Diallo for those who are keeping track.) As always, I will be keeping my first name of Amadou just for simplicity’s sake. Its sort of funny, at my old site everyone was trying to get me to change my last name to Ba because the name of my town literally meant “the place of Ba.” Now that it is finally my name I will soon be changing it to Diallo, which is currently the last name I am supposed to want because “Diallo’s only eat beans, leaves, and dirt” I have to say. This brings up the joking relationships between families and friends that exists here. I believe I have mentioned this before but it is work ruminating on again.
They love to pick on each other. At first this seemed crass and socially “undeveloped” to me, but I have come to appreciate it in the wider context of how the culture operates. Can you imagine going up to a Smith in the states that you didn’t know and saying “your last name is no good, you’re whole family is dirty and eats trash” just because your last name is Thomas and expect the person to not think twice about it? One of the great advantages of a culture that places high value on community is that it takes a lot to disrupt the social equilibrium. My old landlord and I used to get into vicious verbal fights about the rent every month because, and the whole village agreed with this, he was crazy. Still no matter how upset we were with each other that day he never held a drudge into the morning. Personally I believe that part of that was because he had to recognize that my position was pretty reasonable and he was just trying to extort money from me, despite the fact that he always ended every argument about trying to get me to pay more that we had agreed to with “in the end money does matter it is only God who judges us.” Which I thought was pretty ironic. Whatever the reasons were, the fact that he never was angry the next day is very typical for West African culture and that I hope has positively rubbed off on me.
Saturday, August 15, 2009
New Life
First of all, thanks again to everyone for all your support through the last few weeks and especially to my family for your loving concern. After having to chose from a lot of options in a few days, a process that was greatly facilitated by PC Washington staff, I settled on finishing my service as a Small Enterprise Development volunteer doing eco tourism work in southern Senegal. All things being what they are, I am pretty excited about this opportunity since it will allow me to do more of my favorite type of work. My new site will also be pretty sweet. It is near three large waterfalls and chimpanzees frequent the area. Perhaps I will get the chance to live in what we all think of as "Africa" after all. I will be going through training again but first I am taking the opportunity to go to the village on the Senegalese side of the river from my site where I will be able to invite my friends and family over to say goodbye. All and all I am happy to be finishing my service in Senegal and look forward to the new adventure. Senegal is definitely a nicer place to be in but I have a feeling my heart will always be in Mauritania; hardship accompanied by wonderful people has profound affect. I hope to have the opportunity to return there as a volunteer and especially to help train a new class of volunteers.
For now, I am living in the moment and relishing this new adventure as much as I can.
For now, I am living in the moment and relishing this new adventure as much as I can.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
End of Service Speech
I read this speech last night at our final dinner all together as a group of PCVs and staff:
I volunteered to do say something tonight and realized that is an impossible speech to make, there are just too many milestones that are passing. We have to deal with PC RIM being suspended, saying goodbye to PCVs, saying goodbye to APCDs, saying goodbye to Obie, and saying goodbye to Jody. The challenge is to meld all of these strands that are somewhat perversely twisted together here and produce some sort of catharsis that I feel like we all greatly need. Whether you are a PCV, APCD, CD, or THE D, you have been involved in the process of transition for at least three months. I know for us adopted Mauritanians, we have had this day in the back of our minds ever since it was announced there was no new stage class. It has been a long time dealing with uncertainty, guessing at what was going to happen, and plans interrupted. Some how I don't think my great talent of being able to recite all of the lyrics to Ice Ice Baby is going to suffice in this case.
Fortunately one of the benefits of this crux in the transition between the adventures in life is that it makes the true importance of what we value clearly stand out. More than any other facet of our busy existence, our relationships and connections to each other are what shine through in this difficult time. They have kept us in high spirits through tough situations and have brought us to tears when we knew the worst was true. In fact, I think perhaps when describing the Peace Corps there is no better framework to use than that of relationships. Today sum of us were asked to write our elevator speech about our experience in the Peace Corps in preparation for our return to the US. I would like to share mine with you now.
Given that I have a penchant for quotes as a way of explaining the truths in life in the most elegantly concise manner, if I were to sum up my PC experience in a sentence I would use Alfred Tennyson’s axiom of “I am a part of all that I have met.” I do not believe that I could find a more authentic sentiment about my time in the PC than that. In fact, I would challenge you all to do better. After all, at its heart, the PC is about establishing relationships. It says so directly in its 2nd and 3rd goals and the 1st instructs you do to just that in order to accomplish its own objectives. I have a good feeling that most of the countries in which the PC operates also implicitly teach the same lesson. The reason it takes a half an hour to walk across a small village in Mauritania is because that when you really think about it, whatever pressing activity you are going to do is almost never really more important to you than your friends and family. It is this lesson that the PC teaches us that keeps APCDs around for decades, makes a CD want to stay past what is allowed, and makes it very painful for a director to step down and say good by to an organization that does nothing but give.
Yes, I do believe that Tennyson spoke truth but I also believe that his quote is unfinished. If I may be so bold I would like to say that the full quote ought to be “I am a part of all that I have met and therefore all those that I know will remain with me throughout my wanderings.” As our shared time together fractures apart and we all head off to new and differently great adventures we can rely on the connections we have made and the relationships we have formed to carry us through this difficult transition period. At least as long as the PC keeps buying us phone credit.
Unfortunately most of us will not be able to share in person with our Mauritanian friends and family how much our connection to them means to us. However, we do have the opportunity to share that feeling with each here to night. To my fellow PCVs I’d like to speak for us all when I say that you guys mean the world to me. I can’t express how amazing it has been have become instantly close to you in the first few days of stage and then for that connection have grown so much stronger. We have all survived the worst hazing that Mauritania has to offer and have become closer and stronger for it. To the staff that is here with us tonight, we cannot thank you enough. You have consistently proven that the PC is not a job but a connection to service that one is called to. You have tutored us, aided us, and even sent us on paid vacation. For all this and more on behalf of the current RIM PCVs I would like to offer you all a small token of appreciation of the connection you have taken the time to build with us.
Tennyson says, “I am a part of all that I have met,” and I know that I will be connected to all of you for the rest of my life. In honor of that connection I would like to close with a poem and blessing that my father wrote to me when he first heard the news that PC RIM was being shut down:
The deck, it appears, is being shuffled yet again. May hope, peace,
and joy that passes all understanding sustain and flourish in you. The currents, and eddies of history are often capricious.
In all things love abides
I volunteered to do say something tonight and realized that is an impossible speech to make, there are just too many milestones that are passing. We have to deal with PC RIM being suspended, saying goodbye to PCVs, saying goodbye to APCDs, saying goodbye to Obie, and saying goodbye to Jody. The challenge is to meld all of these strands that are somewhat perversely twisted together here and produce some sort of catharsis that I feel like we all greatly need. Whether you are a PCV, APCD, CD, or THE D, you have been involved in the process of transition for at least three months. I know for us adopted Mauritanians, we have had this day in the back of our minds ever since it was announced there was no new stage class. It has been a long time dealing with uncertainty, guessing at what was going to happen, and plans interrupted. Some how I don't think my great talent of being able to recite all of the lyrics to Ice Ice Baby is going to suffice in this case.
Fortunately one of the benefits of this crux in the transition between the adventures in life is that it makes the true importance of what we value clearly stand out. More than any other facet of our busy existence, our relationships and connections to each other are what shine through in this difficult time. They have kept us in high spirits through tough situations and have brought us to tears when we knew the worst was true. In fact, I think perhaps when describing the Peace Corps there is no better framework to use than that of relationships. Today sum of us were asked to write our elevator speech about our experience in the Peace Corps in preparation for our return to the US. I would like to share mine with you now.
Given that I have a penchant for quotes as a way of explaining the truths in life in the most elegantly concise manner, if I were to sum up my PC experience in a sentence I would use Alfred Tennyson’s axiom of “I am a part of all that I have met.” I do not believe that I could find a more authentic sentiment about my time in the PC than that. In fact, I would challenge you all to do better. After all, at its heart, the PC is about establishing relationships. It says so directly in its 2nd and 3rd goals and the 1st instructs you do to just that in order to accomplish its own objectives. I have a good feeling that most of the countries in which the PC operates also implicitly teach the same lesson. The reason it takes a half an hour to walk across a small village in Mauritania is because that when you really think about it, whatever pressing activity you are going to do is almost never really more important to you than your friends and family. It is this lesson that the PC teaches us that keeps APCDs around for decades, makes a CD want to stay past what is allowed, and makes it very painful for a director to step down and say good by to an organization that does nothing but give.
Yes, I do believe that Tennyson spoke truth but I also believe that his quote is unfinished. If I may be so bold I would like to say that the full quote ought to be “I am a part of all that I have met and therefore all those that I know will remain with me throughout my wanderings.” As our shared time together fractures apart and we all head off to new and differently great adventures we can rely on the connections we have made and the relationships we have formed to carry us through this difficult transition period. At least as long as the PC keeps buying us phone credit.
Unfortunately most of us will not be able to share in person with our Mauritanian friends and family how much our connection to them means to us. However, we do have the opportunity to share that feeling with each here to night. To my fellow PCVs I’d like to speak for us all when I say that you guys mean the world to me. I can’t express how amazing it has been have become instantly close to you in the first few days of stage and then for that connection have grown so much stronger. We have all survived the worst hazing that Mauritania has to offer and have become closer and stronger for it. To the staff that is here with us tonight, we cannot thank you enough. You have consistently proven that the PC is not a job but a connection to service that one is called to. You have tutored us, aided us, and even sent us on paid vacation. For all this and more on behalf of the current RIM PCVs I would like to offer you all a small token of appreciation of the connection you have taken the time to build with us.
Tennyson says, “I am a part of all that I have met,” and I know that I will be connected to all of you for the rest of my life. In honor of that connection I would like to close with a poem and blessing that my father wrote to me when he first heard the news that PC RIM was being shut down:
The deck, it appears, is being shuffled yet again. May hope, peace,
and joy that passes all understanding sustain and flourish in you. The currents, and eddies of history are often capricious.
In all things love abides
Monday, August 10, 2009
Done
PC Mauritania is indefinitely suspended.
Fortunately the Mauritanian staff will keep their jobs until the program reopens, but no one is holding their breath for that to happen. The country has taken a serious dive in the direction it is heading and it will be a long recovery process when it turns around.
In the next four days we will be pumped through sessions on our options, medical evaluations, final reports, and lots of other procedures and then some of us will be returning home on Friday. Personally, I intend on coming home, but not that soon and then returning to somewhere to finish out my second year, probably West Africa because less than 1% of Americans speak French and they really need volunteers who do. I am in no way ready to be done with the Peace Corps and I am even less ready to say goodbye to my host family. How do you tell some one whose life was saved by a PCV when he was a child, said that Allah put love for the Peace Corps in his heart, and has since devoted his life to voluntarily and doggedly supporting any PCV he meets that not only are you abruptly leaving he might never see a PCV again? Needless to say, despite the fact that we all saw this coming, we are quite shaken up. You have to understand that this is not just our job that was canceled, but our lives as we know them.
As I figure out what happens next, I will let you know. Right now the only things I am sure of is that I am going to sleep, will eat breakfast tomorrow, and then start dealing with a whole new reality.
Fortunately the Mauritanian staff will keep their jobs until the program reopens, but no one is holding their breath for that to happen. The country has taken a serious dive in the direction it is heading and it will be a long recovery process when it turns around.
In the next four days we will be pumped through sessions on our options, medical evaluations, final reports, and lots of other procedures and then some of us will be returning home on Friday. Personally, I intend on coming home, but not that soon and then returning to somewhere to finish out my second year, probably West Africa because less than 1% of Americans speak French and they really need volunteers who do. I am in no way ready to be done with the Peace Corps and I am even less ready to say goodbye to my host family. How do you tell some one whose life was saved by a PCV when he was a child, said that Allah put love for the Peace Corps in his heart, and has since devoted his life to voluntarily and doggedly supporting any PCV he meets that not only are you abruptly leaving he might never see a PCV again? Needless to say, despite the fact that we all saw this coming, we are quite shaken up. You have to understand that this is not just our job that was canceled, but our lives as we know them.
As I figure out what happens next, I will let you know. Right now the only things I am sure of is that I am going to sleep, will eat breakfast tomorrow, and then start dealing with a whole new reality.
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